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Pitcher: Mario- he's a real flamethrower
Catcher: Ash- gotta catch 'em all
First base: Captain Olimar- he can pik 'em
Second base: ???
Shortstop: Toad- short stop heh
Third base: Bowser- he's certainly used to the hot corner
Left field: Ness- we know he can swing the bat so he's got to play some where
Center field: Kirby- just a play on "Kirby Puckett" since I can't think of anything better
Right field: Donkey Kong- good throwing arm

Basically all of video gaming post-1983 can be traced to this one guy, regardless of company. Before the NES, home video games in the USA were dead and the situation was only slightly better elsewhere. With no Yamauchi, there not aren't Nintendo consoles, but there probably isn't a Playstation or X-Box either, and I bet the PC and smartphone game markets wouldn't so hot, although they probably would exist.

Similarly, without Yamauchi, there probably aren't Seattle Mariners either. They'd be in Tampa or something.

Yamauchi never saw the Mariners play live, even declining to travel from his home in Kyoto to Tokyo in March 2012 when the Mariners played a series of exhibition games there and later opened their season against the Oakland Athletics.

Basically all of video gaming post-1983 can be traced to this one guy, regardless of company. Before the NES, home video games in the USA were dead and the situation was only slightly better elsewhere. With no Yamauchi, there not aren't Nintendo consoles, but there probably isn't a Playstation or X-Box either, and I bet the PC and smartphone game markets wouldn't so hot, although they probably would exist.

There was clearly a market for home video games. If there was no Nintendo then perhaps the rise of computer games happens faster before another home video game system comes along. Either way either Atari or another company would have rebounded or hit it big or computers fill the role.

Yamauchi never saw the Mariners play live, even declining to travel from his home in Kyoto to Tokyo in March 2012 when the Mariners played a series of exhibition games there and later opened their season against the Oakland Athletics.

This is just baffling. Talk about absentee ownership.

In his defense, at the time he acquired the team there was a considerable faction of nativist idiots who lobbied against foreign ownership. Yamauchi did the team and the city a favor and got blasted for his troubles; for the deal to go through he basically had to put the team in a blind trust. I don't know that I would have bothered to make an appearance if I were in his shoes.

To be fair, most of those nativist idiots were actually the billionaires who owned other teams. I seem to remember that the PI and the Oregonian blasted the initial veto of the deal pretty hard, going so far as to call it "racist".

It's actually not blowing the dust out that makes that work, it's the moisture from the breath condensing on the contacts and improving conductivity. But then that promotes rust, degrading the contacts further. So the more you do this, the more you have to blow next time.

I think Miyamoto had as much to do with Nintendo's success as anyone else. He's just a damn good game designer.

I bet Apple would have eventually made a home video game console if Nintendo never did or failed with the NES. I believe Jobs and a few others got their careers started with Atari and would have been as capable as anyone to meet the home console demand.

Yamauchi never saw the Mariners play live, even declining to travel from his home in Kyoto to Tokyo in March 2012 when the Mariners played a series of exhibition games there and later opened their season against the Oakland Athletics.

The Mariners, however, kept an owners' suite at SAFECO Field reserved for him just in case he someday showed up. If you take a tour of the ballpark, you get to go into the suite.

I think Miyamoto had as much to do with Nintendo's success as anyone else. He's just a damn good game designer.

Yes. It is mainly Miyamoto, but I remember reading a book about Nintendo's early game-making, and Yamauchi was bold in bringing the NES to the USA- he even demanded that they skip doing test-markets and jump straight into the fire in New York City.

Pitcher: Mario- he's a real flamethrower
Catcher: Ash- gotta catch 'em all
First base: Captain Olimar- he can pik 'em
Second base: ???
Shortstop: Toad- short stop heh
Third base: Bowser- he's certainly used to the hot corner
Left field: Ness- we know he can swing the bat so he's got to play some where
Center field: Kirby- just a play on "Kirby Puckett" since I can't think of anything better
Right field: Donkey Kong- good throwing arm

Kirby is the best possible CF you could ever have. Floats and would vacuum anything near the wall. "It" would play most of the game with feet off the ground.

I'll throw in Samus at short over Toad. Doubt anything gets by her. If you still need a 2B, can't go wrong with Sheik. No worries about the turn -- she'll be there.

Yes. It is mainly Miyamoto, but I remember reading a book about Nintendo's early game-making, and Yamauchi was bold in bringing the NES to the USA- he even demanded that they skip doing test-markets and jump straight into the fire in New York City.

Agreed. Someone had to make the smart decisions for business. Miyamoto is a wonderful game-mind, on a level I am not sure anyone else has reached, but I doubt very much that he had that big of an influence on blitzkrieg-ing western markets.

It's actually not blowing the dust out that makes that work, it's the moisture from the breath condensing on the contacts and improving conductivity. But then that promotes rust, degrading the contacts further. So the more you do this, the more you have to blow next time.

Serious question - how the hell did every kid know how to do that? We didn't have the internet, and I don't recall it being in the news or anything. Did it just travel by word of mouth?